9A/N: Read and review!
WARNING: This story contains homosexual relationships between two men. There is some cursing as well, although it doesn't appear very often. Lastly, there is death in this story, as the plot revolves around a murder.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The Culprit
Ken stopped his car in front of the house. He looked at it, turned and looked at Raze, and then sighed. "Let's go."
They walked to the house and knocked on the door. A middle-aged woman opened the door, looking at them questioningly before brining up a handkerchief to cough wildly into.
"You are?" she rasped at them.
They exchanged a look. "Mrs. Anderson, I spoke to you on the phone earlier this week, regarding Simon Trent."
She stared at him before nodding, "Yes, I remember that. Warlock, isn't it?"
"Yes ma'am."
"What do you want now?" Now, wasn't she a grumpy woman.
"Are you sick, Mrs. Anderson?" Raze asked abruptly.
She shot him a look, "Can't you tell?"
He smiled in apology, "Your piano classes must be tough on you, then. Isn't there a recital coming up?"
"They've been horrendous, thank you. And don't remind me of that blasted recital."
"Even the ones you've had with Simon?"
"Of course. You think my cold is selective? I wish it was," she said irritably. "I've had to cancel classes, you know, and sometimes finish them early. That's terrible the week before a recital."
Raze glanced at Ken. "Did you finish Simon's class early that day?"
She frowned at him, "I believe so. Yes- I remember that I had a coughing fit and had to leave much earlier than I planned."
"Do you remember when you left?" Ken asked excitedly.
"Five thirty. I thought it was a waste of an entire half hour of practice."
"I see. Well, thank you for your help Mrs. Anderson. You've been a pleasure."
With that, and a huge smile, Raze turned around and dragged Ken to the car. "That's a thirty minutes window. His alibi's shot too," Raze commented as they entered the car.
"I can't believe none of them had a working alibi! None! Rhianna's at some park alone, Maddy actually went there and apparently came back, and Simon was god knows where."
"Maybe at the school?" Raze suggested.
Ken turned to look at him, "Maybe." His phone rang, and Ken picked it up, switching on the speaker so that it wouldn't interfere with his driving.
"Yes?"
"Hey Kenneth, it's Tom Moore from the lab."
"Hey, Tom. Did you check the beaker?"
"Yes, I just did. I didn't find any fingerprints on it, but I did find something odd."
"Odd?"
"Yes. When I examined the beaker, it looked like it had been swiped clean to remove fingerprints. But it wasn't just wiped with a cloth, it had been polished."
"Polished?" Raze asked. "Did you find anything about the polish?"
"Yes. There was enough sample available that I was able to run a test. It came out with components of- well, the condensed answer is that I have identified the polish used to clean the beaker as OZ Polish Cream."
"OZ Polish Cream. That's great, Tom. Did you find anything else?"
"Nothing else."
"Thanks Tom, you did us a huge favor."
"No problem."
The call cut; Ken turned to look at Raze, "She could have just dumped it somewhere. She wouldn't go through the trouble of polishing it and then leave it at her house," he stated.
Raze gave a shake of his head. "No, she wouldn't," he agreed.
"But Simon might."
"To get his prints off it. Doesn't he go over to Maddy's house all the time to study?"
"Yes. It would be a good opportunity for him to plant the beaker."
"Simon's house it is."
Since it was the weekend, they caught Simon at his home. Simon's mother opened the door.
"Mrs. Trent, we're Agents Warlock and Simms. Do you mind if we talk to Simon?"
She nodded and let them in. "He's in the living room, practicing," she said, leading them there.
They entered the room to the beautiful sound of the piano being played right. It was a beautiful sight, the grand piano in all its glory and the blonde boy who was playing it. And right next to the piano, seemingly in the spotlight, or at least it seemed that way to Ken, was a bottle of OZ Polishing Cream.
He sighed, "You were right,' he muttered.
Raze gave him a quick, blinding grin. "Of course I was."
As Ken backed up, taking out his phone so that he could call the police, Raze stepped forward to Simon. Ken watched as Simon stopped playing and turned around to see who was calling out his name, saw as the confusion on Simon's face turned to horror when he saw that Raze's smile wasn't gentle; or soft; it was predatory.
And then Simon looked at Ken, and Ken saw the moment the knowledge entered him—the knowledge that he had been caught.
"Operator speaking, how may I help you?"
"Hello, this is Agent Kenneth Warlock speaking, SOUSA ID 63381. Could you send officers to arrest Simon Trent on the charges of murder? The address is…"
"Now, it's done," Raze sighed as he entered the office and collapsed on his desk. Ken looked up and smiled at him. After the police had come and picked Simon up, Ken had left Raze to accompany them, choosing to go back to the office to finish some paperwork.
The last Ken had seen of Simon, he had had a shell-shocked expression on his face. Raze had stated the charges against him, but he hadn't responded at all. His mother had started screaming, shouting at them to back away from her son. Raze had done so, but he had stood firm, a few feet away from Simon, watching him like a hawk.
"He confessed?" Ken asked with a smile, reaching up to brush his fingers over the back of Raze's hand.
The blonde smiled, "Yes. Do you want to hear what happened?"
Ken shot him a look, "Of course."
Raze leaned forward, his eyes shining, "Okay, it goes like this. Our boy, Simon, has this huge, enormous, ginormous, meganormous crush on Bryce Cooper."
Ken raised his eyebrows, "Really. Now that I think about it, he did seem pretty insistent on Bryce being a good guy."
"Yeah. He was also insanely, I mean insanely, jealous of Mark. He caught them together, right? And he's been resentful of Mark since. Now, what happened that day was this: Simon finished his piano lesson early, so he went to the school. Apparently, he wanted to try and sabotage Mark's experiment because everybody wants to do that. Then, he caught Maddy and Mark screaming at each other. He heard their entire conversation."
"He got pissed," Ken stated.
Raze grinned, "He got pissed. He hid himself when Maddy came out, well, stomped out. He peeked back in and saw that Mark was still standing there, still upset about the confrontation with Maddy."
Ken could picture it in his head, the entire scene that Raze was painting. "He went in and confronted him."
"Screamed at him again, I think. Poor Mark, he got screamed at a lot that day. They fought over Bryce. Then, Simon picked up the beaker of acid, he didn't even look at the label, so you can't even give him the benefit of the doubt."
"He told you that?"
"Well, he said he picked up the first thing he saw, so… Anyway, he threw the acid on Mark. Apparently, his face had been splashed first, so that's why he hadn't screamed at all. Mark went down, and Simon panicked. He knew immediately that the guy was dead. So, he moved the body to the cupboard to make it less obvious and hiked it out of there."
"And he knew Maddy had been there, so she was the obvious choice to frame."
"Exactly. Case solved." He heaved a huge sigh, "Man, that took some time."
"And three confessions."
"But we finally got the right one," Raze said with a grin.
Ken stared at his beautiful face. He licked his lips, "Yeah, we did."
Raze's lips twitched, "You want to bang me now, don't you?"
"A little, yeah."
"Let's go over to your house, then."
"We're always going to my house, what about yours?"
"It's still a mess."
"I don't care."
Raze sighed. Then turned to stare at him. He sighed again, "Fine, we'll go there. Be prepared for sandwiches, though, because they're the only thing I make."
Ken laughed "Yeah, all right."
Raze turned to glare at him again, but it melted into a smile. He shook his head and looked away. When they were through with the paperwork, Raze led them down to the parking lot.
"So, follow me to my house?"
Ken nodded, "Yup."
"Okay."
They smiled at each other over the cars. They still had a lot of work to do; Raze wanted to go and talk to Maddy, and apologize to her; he wanted to meet up with Rhianna as well, and talk to her about the drugs.
He got into the car, wondering what Ken would feel about his past. Would he accept it? Would he understand it? Would he be disappointed?
All these questions were running through his head, but Raze felt okay. He felt calm, happy and extremely satisfied.
They had finished their first case. Their partnership had succeeded, in more ways than one. Whatever happened next, Raze had a feeling he could rely on Ken for it.
He could rely his partner, and his lover.
END OF BURN THROUGH MY SKIN
A/N: Hey guys. Hope you liked this first installment. I'm working on the second installment now and it should be out soon.